Case Study: Rockland Provides The Works For Little Caesars Pizza Chain

But then it perfected its pizza, jazzed up its image and, most recently, chose solution provider Rockland Technology Group as its preferred partner for the DiamondTouch POS system.

Now Little Caesar, the company mascot, is grinning from ear to ear.

DiamondTouch features Rockland's own back-office and order-entry management software and TransAct Technologies' POSjet 1000 color inkjet printers.

"We work with other vendors whose printers are certified for our software," said Tom Bronson, president and CEO of Rockland, Dallas. "But the POSjet accounts for about 75 percent of our printer sales today."

The DiamondTouch solution underscores the growing popularity of inkjet printers in the POS arena, and for Detroit-based Little Caesars, the POSjet was a perfect fit.

TransAct's product combines the benefits of thermal and impact printers, but without the drawbacks of each, Bronson said.

Thermal printers are fast, but the heat generated in a pizzeria kitchen turns the paper black, he said. Impact printers can withstand the heat, but they don't print nearly as fast.

And while the quiet engine of a thermal printer would be appreciated in most corporate settings, it wouldn't be appropriate where the sound of order tickets being printed out needs to be heard over the din of pots, pans and industrial-size oven doors opening and closing.

The POSjet from Ithaca, N.Y.-based TransAct prints faster than impact printers, though not quite as quickly as thermals, and "there's something to be said for printing coupons and logos in color," Bronson said.

The Rockland chief said he's already received several DiamondTouch orders from Little Caesars franchisees and expects many more to approach the integrator in 2004. "We anticipate that about 1,900 [Little Caesars] locations will deploy POSjets,with about three or four at each restaurant," he said.

That promises to keep staffers busy at Rockland, which also provides clients with training on its custom software. Rockland works solely in the pizza POS market and delivers its integrated systems to about 65,000 U.S. operations.

If everything goes as planned, Little Caesars will be just one more happy pizza chain and Rockland customer. And that means Little Caesar can go right on smiling.